


No Gods or Kings, Only Men

by cinderadler



Category: Assassin's Creed, Assassin's Creed - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Canon Queer Character, Cock Tease, Crossover, Dinner, Fights, First Kiss, First Meetings, Forehead Kisses, Foreplay, Gentle Kissing, Hard to get, Implied Roth/Topping, In Public, M/M, Older Man/Younger Man, Rooftop Sex, Rough Kissing, Sexual Tension, Teasing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:53:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25251916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinderadler/pseuds/cinderadler
Summary: How strange it is to love a thief. He has my heart because he stole it, when I would have given it freely.(Sequence 8 Reimiagined with more teeth)(Vampire AU, a part-Witcher crossover)
Relationships: Jacob Frye & Maxwell Roth, Jacob Frye/Maxwell Roth
Kudos: 18





	1. Forbidden Fruit

He’s leaning onto the balls of his feet, cracking his knuckles into his palms. It’s not long after six thirty at night, in a dressing room at the back of the Alhambra Theatre and Music Hall.

The air is full of dust playing in the blades of light that cut through the window. Standing before it, Jacob Frye is lit up like a Virgin Mary in church. His is a silhouette on a votive candle. All he can see of this is his own shadow strewn across the carpeted floor. He stealthily tucks his invitation card back into his coat pocket as he waits for something to happen. His wish is granted moments later when he hears a sharp cawing from the table at the far end of the room, followed by an admiring voice.

“Beautiful, isn’t he?” Jacob hears the syrup-thick accent before he sees the crouched, lithe form, resting on his haunches at the back of the large dressing room. The man in front of Jacob wears a crooked smile and an all black suit, white shirt with a bloodstain on the collar and cuff. _This must be him_ , Jacob thinks. Just a man. He’s no God or a King like is whispered in pubs and alleys and threatened between rabble brawling in the streets. Setting eyes upon for the first time, Jacob Frye wonders what Roth’s face would look like unscarred. Perhaps he’d have none of the roguish charm he so evidently exudes. “I call him Asphodel.” Roth points to the small, wide-eyed black bird in the cage on the centre of the table. Jacob doesn’t ask why the bird is named so, he’s sure he wasn’t invited here to discuss a pet bird.

From where the light strays, Roth is hard to make out. Jacob notes his unusually pale pallor and fishes his blue irises out of the grey pools of his eyes. Above the right is a deep cut, nicking his brow, which leads into a stretched out scar along the lateral of his cheek. The shallow point of the arc reaches down and pulls at the corner of his mouth, tugging it into something like a smile. From here it’s hard to say that he wears it well, but Jacob almost admires the peace beneath the damage his soft-looking skin is dressed in. He doesn’t look like he’s ever thrown a punch in his life. He’d stab you as soon as look at you, Jacob deducts; not through lack of strength but rather a dominant touch of cunning which negates every getting his hands too dirty. It can be brutal and still not run up a distinct bill with the tailors, he surmises. Something about this thought impresses him, but what else should be expect from the head of the Blighters. “Forgive me my manners, my dear. Maxwell Roth; I’m charmed.”

“Nice to finally meet the man I’ve heard so much about.” Jacob replies, shaking Maxwell’s extended hand. “And I need no introduction, I’m sure.” Jacob jokes then, grandly bowing, and Maxwell turns his lips up into a wry smile, truly charmed and not just pretending to be. “If you don’t mind me asking: how did you get that?” Jacob touches his own face with the tips of his fingers, sweeping them from his right eyebrow to his cheek, before throwing those tips to Roth to illustrate what he’s referring to.

“Well, since peace and I are strangers grown, I like to think of it as the Devil leaving something behind. Some mortal wound on this earth, some crack on the china as it were.” He gestures with long, elegant fingers up to his face. He smiles, caught up in the fiction he’s weaving and wishing it to be true.

“But really; how did it happen?”

“So soon to ruin the illusion. I’m a powerful man, Mr Frye; I can’t have you swanning about giving away my secrets now, can I?” Roth lets himself grin now with ease. He folds his fingers into his palm and stands up. “Not least so soon, anyway.” It’s only now that Jacob notices Roth is barefoot. With silent steps, the older man approaches the young assassin suddenly. Jacob stands still and notices the air tinge with Roth’s perfume; a mix of spices and dust and smoke. He passes the muscular twenty-something with a light stride and walks on the window at the back of the room. Jacob thinks before turning around to follow his host. _What’s this for? Is he just stringing me along until Starrick appears and runs me through? Is he getting paid by the minute for just existing wildly?_

After a lingering pause, Roth interrupts Jacob’s thoughts.

“I’ve watched you fight, Mr Frye. It was an honour to be in such bloody company. You have my respect.” Roth’s words bounce off the glass of the window. He turns to face Jacob again. “If you wanted, you could have other things of mine too.” The lascivious flick of the tongue which ties the offer off makes Jacob shiver. Perhaps he’s not simply a man, after all, he thinks. _Is he some snake in disguise, bearing poisoned apples or forbidden fruit?_

“You’ve seen me fight?” Jacob clarifies out of curiousity, never having considered before that his and Topping’s brawls attracted a deliberate audience, much less an honoured one.

“Came to see, stayed to watch. You’re quite the fighter.” Roth tips his head slightly. “And such a body; a fine thing to see.” He idly traces his hand down his own chest, from his collar to his stomach, resting heavily on his belt.

“Then you know what I could do to you.” The younger Frye twin realises as the words leave his tongue how filthy the threat is, more base than he intends to act on. Roth laughs openly, sharing his bellowing laugh with Jacob like he did this invitation for dinner and a show.

“Is that a threat or a promise?” Maxwell’s voice becomes hushed and deeper for a hot minute. It shifts again, back into the performance tone that narrated how his scar had come to be. “Why do you think I invited you?” He savours the pause between them. Jacob rocks slightly on his toes. “I can get roughed up any time, my dear boy. I have passengers, I have handfuls of men and women at my beck and call. No,” He starts, weaving a tapestry of his rich and passionate life. Anything he can touch, he can have; it seems. “I got your address because I asked the young Mr Topping politely, up against a wall, under the rail bridge. Closer than we are now. He’s a quiet man, through and through, despite that shouting I discovered. My point being; that address got me to you and got me here. We meet at last.”

Roth opens his arms grandly, as if showing the breadth of his domain. He continues talking as he walks closer and closer to Jacob. “I invited you here so I could spend a night with the bravest man in London. Not get fucked by him.” The blunt dismissal of Jacob curdling curiousity towards the slim but deceptively athletic older man was an affront to his goosepimpled arms. This closeness struck him as dangerous.

“Who said I wanted to fuck you?” Jacob managed to laugh off Roth’s words with a peculiar, mirthless joke. He ineloquently hissed the ‘f’ of fuck which betrayed his fluttering heart. Frye thought on his feet adeptly enough for most of London to be deceived by the clamour he passed off as organised chaos within himself but too much longer around Roth and his piercing wit and Jacob worried that his shine would rub off. Maxwell smiled at him and invited him to sit down, offering him a glass of wine from the open bottle of red waiting on the table.

Jacob accepts, it’d be rude not to, though he waits for Roth to drink first just in case.

“Can I go back, very briefly, and just clarify that you didn’t fuck my associate beneath a train bridge?” Jacob remarks, swallowing a mouthful of wine thoughtfully. Roth laughs lightly at him and drinks before answering.

“Why does it matter to you whether I did or not?”

“It doesn’t, it’s just – Robbie? I can’t say I see it myself. I don’t want to lose all respect for you.” He states dangerously, trying to re-level the playing field.

“How brittle, the folly of youth. Such confidence, so rarely earned!” Roth refills his shallow glass. “It’d be rude of me to have spoken with my mouth full. So that’ll stay as another secret for another night on the town.”

“Assuming I’ll come back?”

“I know you will, dear boy.” He leans against the back of his chair and kicks his feet up onto the table. The soles of his feet are peppered with dust. “I predict a week or two from now I’ll be trying to lose you to fall back down to earth.” He tips his glass towards Jacob before taking a sip from it.

“Oh, you’d lose me. A great man like you?” Jacob imagines with Roth.

“You flatter me, Jacob!”

“You’d toss me aside like a tired plaything when you’d had your fill of me.”

“If losing you means having had you, then I’ll think about it.” Roth muses to himself. “And having my fill of you is a tempting offer...”

“To have me, you’ll to catch me first.” Jacob tempts himself.

“And, don’t tell me, you’re no easy catch? Why would you be?”

“Why wouldn’t I be easy? Sometimes I grow tired of playing and just wait to be caught.”

“And is now one of those times?” Roth enquires, genuinely intrigued.

“No.” The twin returns with a toothy smile.

“Then I’ll ask again after the show.” Roth promises softly, rising again from his chair and inviting Jacob follow him towards the door. “Come on, we’ll be late for dinner.” He picks up a dress coat from the chair nearest the door as he walks. They weren’t late for dinner, but they didn’t have to walk far to the restaurant. Jacob ate with the same hunger he always did and Roth relished the sight of a man enjoy his food that much. He himself ate with a similar ravenousness but a far more restrained form. He feasted like he could afford to, but fear was as powerful a currency as money it appeared. Roth paid, regardless; he wasn’t a crook, he was just in a hurry. They left swiftly after eating and polishing off another glass each of wine, they made their way out into the mild night air to be greeted by the sight of Lewis, Maxwell’s faithful assistant, opening the carriage door for them.

The journey to the theatre seems long but is, in reality, about twenty minutes. They arrive barely early and Roth deftly weaves the shabby-coated assassin through the bustling crowd and up the steps into the Opera House. The night feels longer than it is, especially in the solitude of Roth’s private box. Maxwell swore to God that this is no ruse, it is exactly what the invitation told it to be; dinner and a show. The opera is a level of art that Jacob doesn’t have the interest to appreciate. He finds his eyes wandering to the man beside him. Roth’s eyes are concentrated on the unfolding matter on the stage below them. They’re brighter with the stage lights. He has put shoes on for this event. He’s almost entirely in black now, which makes Jacob wonder cruelly if he cracked open Maxwell’s ribs if his heart would be the same colour. His teeth are sharp when he smiles at the action or when his mouth falls open slightly in awe. Something about his teeth, in this moment, makes Jacob want to touch them. With the tips of his fingers or perhaps with his own, he feels a sudden, drowning urge to kiss him. He swallows the feeling after a panicked second, almost choking on it. He makes just enough noise to have Maxwell turn to him with both frustrated and searching eyes, to find Jacob looking right at him.

“Everything alright, my dear?” Roth asks in a hushed tone. Jacob nods at him hurriedly, swallowing again instinctively. He flashes Jacob a quick smile before turning his face back to the stage. Beside him, Jacob’s stomach flutters with a nervousness that possesses him again, but one that makes him move now. The song on stage builds to its inevitable crescendo as he leans forwards gently in his chair, bringing his fingers to touch Roth’s cheek. He catches the thin man’s pale blue eyes as he brings their lips together, closing the gap between their teeth. Roth’s lips are warm and soft beneath his own. Jacob still this kiss with closed lips. He lingers and Roth waits, hanging on, until Jacob draws back and finds himself looking at Roth for answers. Roth smiles slightly, lifting his hand to touch Jacob’s nose and then lips in a shushing motion. The older man then returns his attention to the drama unfolding on stage. Eventually the show ends. Jacob paid very little attention to everything before the kiss, to be fair, but even less after. He spent his time examining himself and wondering if he could crawl inside his own stomach to not have to face judgement for his actions.

They are silent as they leave the grand building, barely straying more than a foot apart from the other. Jacob is sure that he’s cursed this thing they shared to be strange forever. No longer playful, as it had begun as. They duly got into Roth’s carriage and Roth sits opposite Jacob, so their feet touch.

“Let me help you bring a little more than harm to Starrick and his clowns; and if I don’t, you can waltz into the Alhambra yourself and stick that piece of yours right down my throat until I choke.” The sheer, quiet violence of Roth’s terms of engagement made Jacob want to peel off every layer of the man to find out more. Again, the assassin twin wonders if he wants to kiss the man, just to see what he tastes like. That would be a way of knowing him.

On that thought, he catches his fingers on the notion that Robert Topping knows more about Roth than he does. Refusing to leave that reality dominate his own, Jacob looks up through his lashes as Roth, who is looking at him as he leans back against the plush carriage interior. They meet eyes for a time as they speak without words, trying to outsmart the other by staying completely still.

Jacob flinches and launches his body forwards, placing his hand flat on the bench of carriage between Roth’s thighs to support himself, pressing his mouth against Roth’s with considerable force. Something quiet had lead to this outburst of almost aggressive passion. Something was going to give. It just so happened to be Jacob’s patience, unsurprisingly. Roth kissed the younger man back with just as much force, splitting Jacob’s sticky lips with his tongue. Darting it over his teeth and running it against his, Jacob leans further forwards sinking his weight into Roth’s body. The kiss deepens quickly as Jacob uses his free hand to tilt Roth’s head towards his own. Roth’s hands knot together at the fingers and wrap around the assassin’s neck, pulling his finely-formed body towards his open knees. The fight continues as the turn a sharp corner, both breathing shallowly in sync. Roth makes a sound beneath Jacob’s skilled weight, Jacob convinces himself that it’s a moan. Roth pulls Jacob towards him again, causing the assassin’s gauntleted wrist to rub against his groin, eliciting a squirm and gasp of pleasure this time. Almost as soon as that air leaves Roth’s lungs, the pair are thrown apart by the premature and sudden stopping of the carriage. Their heads crack together as they come to a very sharp halt.

“Ow.” Jacob lets out , wincing as he begins to leans back from Roth properly. Roth smiles, nearly affectionately now, revealing streaks of fresh blood over his teeth as he does. “Roth—” The fidgety assassin spits out. “—you’re bleeding.”

“I bit my own tongue open just then.” He retorts, spitting a mouthful of blood out of the carriage window onto the cobbles. “Not to worry, my dear boy; been through worse.”

“Why’ve we stopped?” Jacob slowly thinks to ask, his mind somewhat elsewhere.

“Lewis!” Maxwell calls out behind himself. He needs ask no more, his loyal subordinate already knows the question.

“Mr Frye’s abode, sir.”

“Ahh, well.” He shrugs in understanding. “This must be goodnight then, Mr Frye.” He holds his hand out to Jacob’s to shake it. “It’s been a pleasure.”

“It has been educational.” Jacob grins, pulling himself together. He runs his hands flat down his front in a show of readying himself to leave before stepping out of the carriage door which Lewis appears to open for him. As the horse trots away, Jacob hears Roth call out after him.

“Come to the Alhambra sometime. Let’s raise a little hell together.”


	2. Shadow Play

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The crossover the world's been waiting for.  
> Maximum Dracula...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lmk what u think  
> I love Regis so much, what a sweetie xx

A few days later, Roth is sorting through a cabinet of notes and business invoices. He’s enjoying the relative peace of the early afternoon, not far outside the ajar window. The humdrum of the street is disturbed suddenly by the charming, low roll of a nearby voice.

“If I were God; where would I be?” Jacob utters as he hops through the open window and walks on the tips of his boots towards Maxwell.

“Jesus!” Roth jumps, reaching for his heart. “Where did you come from?”

“I was raised in Crawley but that’s by-the-by, really.” Jacob quips quickly. “You should keep that window closed.”

A few days from now, Jacob would realise how farcical Roth’s overreaction to his arrival was. At this moment, however, he can’t know that Roth had heard every step up the wall and each heaved breath that escaped between jumps from ledge to ledge. He really was a better actor than Jacob had given him credit for.

“It’s a pleasant surprise to see you;” Roth starts, letting his heart go. “-to what do I owe the occasion?”

“I came to invite you to the Mitre Lane fight club tonight. If you’re not busy.” He smiles at the older man and his shadowed features. “I was just thinking since you were so enraptured last time we spoke, about all the needless bloodshed and the sweat on my brow---”

“You can stop hawking your wares, you’ve already sold me with your kind offer. I’d love to come and see you split a few lips.” He tucks away the papers he’d put aside on top of the cabinet. “I’ll meet you there?”

“It’s a date.”

“Is it now?” Roth queries as Jacob is half out of the window, stopping him in his tracks.

“Why not?” Jacob calls back as he swoops out of the frame, leaving Roth to his peace again.

A few hours later, they’re reunited outside the Mitre Lane fight club in all of it’s glory. It’s a mostly disused building with very shallow lighting, perfect for knocking teeth and maybe also boots if you can find yourself a nice, dark corner. In the doorway, Roth places a rewarding kiss to Jacob’s forehead, for luck. Then, he strides away from the plucky assassin like they’re complete strangers. Something about this is a ritual to them both.

Barely an hour later and the sky is already much darker when they greet it again. Jacob is bloodied but not too badly injured. He swept every round he was in and has pocketed a healthy sum, thanks to Topping’s generous odds. He shrugs on his coat and wanders out the back door, spying for the Blighters’ master in the crowd of bustling bodies.

Nothing jumps out at him until a taller-hatted man slinks off to the side, leaving Roth in clear view. He’s talking to man of equal height but wider build, grey hair and a friendly face. He’s clutching a satchel hooked around his body, fulls of scrolls and books. He looks like a scientist of some old description, nothing so native to London. He’s a confusing anachronistic looking man, especially in conversation with the dandy of Maxwell with all of his flash charm and silk-lined-suits. The man he’s talking with smiles widely and it takes years off him suddenly. He looks rugged and well-travelled but clearly not from around hear. Jacob can’t quite understand what they’re saying from this distance but the other man’s voice is rich and calm in a way that Roth’s is sharp-edged and rough to the touch.

“Who’s your friend?” Jacob enquires with genuine curiousity.

“Well, if it isn’t the Rooks’ beak himself!” Roth announces with equal candour and volume. Roth waves at his friend who leaves them be, gesturing slightly to Jacob, champion fighter. Jacob laughs the remark off, aware to some degree that is a show for all those around them who are bothering to watch or listen to the pair’s interactions.

“Not to crow but I’m on the up-and-up, unlike some. Complacent up there, I assume. Must be cold, up so high. Especially at your age, and all that.” Roth admires his exposed chest as he talks before pretending with him further.

“Brevity is the soul of wit, my darling.”

“You’re so old I can almost see through you.”

“Oh, how hurtful! My poor feelings, whatever will I do with myself.”

“If this breeze picks up it’ll take you with it.” Jacob wraps up his performance. “Go on, slope off to lick your wounds.” He leaves with a vicious and wide smile, letting his coat flap in the night breeze.

When two people leave a situation in different directions, it’s rare to assume they will meet at the logical end of that same circle. Yet, they do; both men as close as they were minutes ago but 9 minutes older and a quarter of a mile further away as the crow flies.

“Jacob, my darling!” Roth rejoices, having gotten there first. He grabs Jacob’s tender face between his palms and kisses him squarely on the lips with appreciation. “I like the show, the whole song-and-dance just now; nice touch.”

“How do you think I got to be the Templar’s terror of the East End? Showmanship is at least half of it.” He laughs softly, feeling for Roth’s wrists to rest his hands around.

“I have something I’d like to tell you.” Roth utters, looking Jacob in the eye.

“One moment – first – can I---” Jacob cuts himself off by gently kissing Maxwell and pulling his thinner bodyweight to hold down his own. It’s a sumptuous kiss that deepens without any real intent, it follows a natural trajectory of lust fuelled by blood. They both release themselves to the warmth they’re harbouring between their mouths and hips. Roth even feels his teeth prick his tongue as it slides over Jacob’s. At this feeling, he pulls away, snagging Jacob’s pulled lip in the process.

“Ow! You bit my lip.” Jacob takes his fingers to search for the blood he assumes is there.

“I didn’t mean to-“ Roth fumbles for once. “Didn’t you like it?”

“That’s besides the point, I didn’t realise we were getting rough.” Jacob muses, smiling richly and laying his hands on Roth’s chest and pushing them both to the other side of the darkened underpass. He slides the hand on Roth’s chest down the centreline of his waistcoat, running it to tightly pull, unpin and release Roth’s belt buckle in one fluid flick of the wrist. He sets a messy kiss on Roth’s neck and again up his throat as he slips his hand inside his trousers and teases Roth’s throbbing cock through the fabric of his pants. He tries feverishly to kiss Roth but Roth resists and speaks instead.

“Jacob, I need to tell you something.”

“Did I do something?” He becomes quiet with rarely seen self-consciousness. Concerned for a fleeting thought that Roth only like Jacob when he’s subservient to him.

“No-no---I just, have to tell you before we go any further.” The mood cools between them, backed by their slow and heavy breathing. “And go with me on this, even if it sounds stupid.” Roth has become peculiarly small and demure as he opens himself up to Jacob. “I don’t want you to think I’m a danger to you, but I am different.” He starts. “I’m not the man you think I am. Not a man at all, just pretending to be one.”

“What?” Jacob is suitably bewildered.

“Do you believe in ghosts? Monsters? Fairy stories?” Roth is spitting this out without the force of spitting, he’s not really had the opportunity to explain to anyone before. He’s regretting his choice now, but Jacob’s persistent association to being covered in blood has made it trying until now and could prove fatal if he doesn’t tell him the truth now. “Ask me to smile, for instance.”

“Why? Roth what is this?”

“Please.”

“Smile.” Jacob almost laments but does as he’s asked. Roth does and flashes the young man two incredibly sharp incisors, unnaturally present in his upper jaw. He’s never noticed them before, but he doesn’t suspect that is because they weren’t there. “Teeth.” He blurts out, confused.

“I thought it would be easier to show you.”

“They look like cat claws but... teeth.”

“I’m cursed.”

“With teeth? Have they always been there?”

“The teeth are just part of it. It’s hunger, it’s thirst, it’s lust for life.”

“I’m unnaturally alive. I’m like a dog, I feed on the blood of living things, and it gives me life.”

“Like dogs? Rats?”

“How old do you think I am?” Roth disregards Jacob’s question.

“I don’t know---- 40? 44?” He’s trying to take this all in and make some sense of it.

“I’m 110, my dear.” Jacob grips Roth’s coat in desperation.

“Are you joking?” Is all he can say.

“It’s called vampirism, in folk tales.” This voice startles them from their mutual stupor.

Roth and Jacob were so collectively caught up in Roth’s crooked and badly-told tale that they weren’t of any clarity to hear the soft crunch of footsteps beside them. They notice the moonlight fade from them but too late to connect the pieces that it’s a person blocking that light. “I could find that perfume from a mile away.” Jacob flies apart from Roth, stumbling as he does. “Oh, no, don’t stop on my account.” The voice, he recognises. He can’t make the man out until he leans his body away from Roth’s, but when he does he realises that this man was the one talking to Roth outside the fight club. “Good evening, Maxwell, again; and I believe we’ve not been introduced – Jacob Frye, young-blood star of the fight club this evening.” The older, kindly but lithe man extends his hand to Jacob, who is trying to feel that the earth is flat beneath his feet for a moment of stability. “Emiel Regis Rohellec Terzieff-Godefroy, a pleasure to meet you.”

“Regis to his friends.” Roth interjects, having collected himself. “Perfect timing, my dear friend.”

“Sorry – who are you?” Jacob runs his sore hand through his hair, pulling it back from his face.

“I release this is a bit much for you but I’m an old travelling companion of Mr Roth’s here.” “We go way back.” Roth aids Regis’ rubric.

“It’s rare that I’m back in this cesspool city but I thought it’d be a shame to not drop in and say hello.” Regis is astute and polite as he explains himself to the assassin. “I don’t want to interrupt. You’re looking well, Maxwell.”

“And yourself – you don’t look a day over 400.” He laughs heartily and touches Jacob’s side as a show of support.

“Have I died?” Jacob reels, exclaiming. “What’s going on?”

“I did say it would be a lot to tell him.” Regis notes to Maxwell.

“I am dead, aren’t I?” Jacob appeals to the two impossibly old men.

“You’re not, my darling, but your heart’s going like the clappers; better sit down for a moment, eh?” Roth tells the assassin as he folds himself into a sitting position, submitting his body to the security of the earth that he knows and has always known but now, suddenly, doubts. “I don’t expect you to swallow it all straight away. I just needed to tell you.”

“Perhaps we should retire somewhere and have a little drink, ease our racing hearts?” Regis suggests with a gentle, learned smile. “You’ve not died. Your world’s just a little wider is all.” Both men use their unexpected strength to support Jacob’s deadweight body as he returns from the verge of fainting. They carry him a considerable distance until he feels he can walk again. Just after Jacob feels mortal again, enough to walk anyway, he notices where Regis and Roth are leading him too. Roth leads and Regis follows in his stead as they turn the corner onto Jacob’s street.

“Here we are!” Roth announces, decadent in his selfless choice. Jacob feels a momentary pang of uncertainty, questioning why Roth didn’t lead them back to the Alhambra. He unlocks the door and walks in, listening for signs of life.

“No one’s in.” Regis chimes in, answering Jacob’s question without him verbalising it. “Before you ask: I can’t read your mind but you looked like you were listening for something.” Regis smiles softly again, he provides Roth a certain balance. Jacob wonders as he turns on his heels whether Roth and his friend have ever touched, or kissed, or more. There’s something seductive about the oldest man’s voice and his clear softness, Jacob wouldn’t blame Roth. Both men linger in the doorway like they’re waiting for something until Jacob clumsily offers that they come in. They follow him in and around the corner into the large downstairs room. It’s cluttered with trinkets and token over the walls, shelves and desktops, but it looks like a home and not a house in that regard. Seeing the inner workings of the bravest man in London curdles in Roth’s heart, the bits of the man the myth doesn’t let on; the boots under the bed, the torn coat slung over the back of a chair with a needle in, the half-penned diary page left open poking out from where the coat spilled onto the desk.

“Check the larder for anything stronger than water.” Jacob offers and Regis courteously leaves to look for some Dutch courage and three glasses. He and Roth get nothing from something so weak, having an inhuman tolerance for alcohol and narcotics, but he hopes it’ll make Jacob feel more at ease. Regis moves lightly as he treads, careful not to disturb this place that is not his own. As Roth’s invited guest, he is respectful to a fault. He returns to the room to find Roth running his fingers through Jacob’s hair with a natural ease, the young man almost asleep in his arms.

Regis clinks the glasses together as he sets them down and pours what looks like a finger-measure each before toasting to their health. A few more drinks down the line, Jacob’s restlessness turns into quiet curiousity as he seems more at peace with the strange new world of realising there are men cursed to suck blood to survive.

“You eat people?” Jacob asks Roth more than he makes a statement.

“In a manner of speaking you eat people too, Jacob.”

“That’s different---that’s fun—fun can’t kill you.”

“As a wise man once said.” Regis chimes in, enjoying the lightness of Jacob’s company.

“But do you?” He asks and reaches out to touch Roth’s teeth again.

“That’s a bold choice, Mr Frye. Much like putting your head in the mouth of a lion.” Regis observes, leafing through a book on a high shelf.

“When we have to, and sometimes when we don’t. We’re temperamental creatures.” Roth replies, unable to lose his returned sharpness. “But we eat to survive, like you. Just for lifetimes longer, hundreds of years, maybe even centuries.”

“So you can’t die?” Jacob enquires, opening his closed eyes.

“We can but we’re a higher form of our being.”

“It’s how we can walk out in the sunlight without shrivelling to a crackling.” Regis adds.

“It takes a significant amount of work and truly only a higher vampire can absolutely destroy another.” Roth concludes, moving then to wrap his hands around Jacob’s cheeks. “So you might need to cross me of your hit list, sweetheart.” He kisses the man’s forehead lightly, leaning him down on the bed and stepping back.

“I could send him to sleep if you like?” Regis quietly offers to Roth, having honed his skills of persuasion to the point of hypnotism over the years. Roth had never tried to craft himself into anything other than himself, he’d never taken to learning dark arts or mysticisms since Regis had turned him all those years ago.

“No, don’t, Regis, my dear. Let him sleep it off naturally. I’ll be the one paying hell when he wakes up and can’t remember his name otherwise.” Roth cracks into a soft, hushed chuckle as he turns to look at his old friend.

“So, what now?” Jacob croaks from the bed, prone and on the door to sleep.

“Rest, my darling. When you’re ready, come and find me.” Roth almost sings these words. Regis stands and collects the glasses and the bottle of swill whisky, returning them all the cracked counter in the kitchen. The cursed, eternal men leave Jacob to his dreams, for what they will be that night, and apparate into the darkness of the moonless sky. Moments later they meet again, having misted in through the open window into Roth’s office at the Alhambra, under cover of night. The pair sit back, slouched on the floor with their backs leaning against the wall beneath the window, exchanging stories and fables of the years they’ve been apart. The comfort Roth finds in this shedding of a skin brings him peace that night, unlike so many before it. Regis isn’t in the city for long before he moves on to foreign climes but he promises to return before the year is out. Jacob fills him with promise, he has a good heart, he tells Roth truthfully.

“He’s beautiful, isn’t he?”

“Captivating, certainly, but I daresay not my type, Maxwell.” Regis smiles laxly now, indulging in the closeness of this moment. He needn’t persuade Roth of anything, he knows.

“I was, and we’re not so different, he and I.”

“Your eyes are going, I fear, my good friend.” Regis laughs. ”I won’t deny there are similarites you share though; instincts, passions that involve inflicting trophy-damage to your tender bodies, restless souls. Something fearless that danger attracts.” Roth admires Regis’ kind but aged eyes in the dimness. His heart is still as huge as it was the day they met. “Be careful with him.”

“I’ll loosen my grip and everything.”

”Not that, sweet one, I mean; he could be the death of you.” Regis touches the back of Roth’s wrist gently. “Each like fire and powder, as they kiss; consume.”

“All these centuries travelling and living a hundred lives and still you settle on Shakespeare?” Roth mulls, slightly on the defensive now.

“We never truly change; we just look like we do, over the years.” Regis muses, right as always.

The next day Jacob wakes up feeling less groggy than he’d anticipated, and strangely lighter somehow. He shambles into the kitchen and notes the whisky mostly finished and the three glasses besides and recalls pieces of the night but doesn’t remember Roth or Regis (was that his name?) leaving.

He swills a glass and uses it for water. After leaning with his head over the sink for a minute or two, he swings himself back and searches for something heavy to eat to offset the swaying in his stomach.

On coming backout of the larder, he spies Evie outside and make a beeline for her.

“Sister!” He shouts, unable to judge his own volume. He can see her rolling her eyes even from this distance.

“I wondered when you’d wake up, brother dearest.” She replies with a half-smile. “I did for a while think you might be dead. But you were breathing, so I let you be.”

“Where were you last night? The house smelled like a parlour.”

“I could ask you the same question.”

“I was visiting Henry if it’s any of your business, and that doesn’t answer my question.” She stops what she’s doing.

“I had some friends around. Musky friends, very perfumed ones.” He goes on, exaggerating the actually quite subtle smell of different perfumes lacing the downstairs of the house. “How’s Henry? Is he well?” Jacob then asks.

“He’s well, thank you. Unseasonably adult of you to ask.”

“Oh really? Last I saw he was looking a little green around the gills.” Jacob laughs to himself. He bites into the apple in his hand.

“That’s abominable and not even funny Jacob. God forbid the person who has to put up with you for the rest of their lives.”

“Is one enough, dear Evie? But, as it happens, I have my eye on a fella.”

“Oh really?”

“Why? Surprised? Scandalised?”

“Nothing you’ve ever done has surprised me, Jacob; you’re too outlandish to be surprising anymore. I’d be more surprised if you decided to join the church and swear of men and women altogether.” 

“I think half of London would be surprised, to be honest Ev—and so terribly disappointed.”

“Oh I’m sure. I can hear hearts breaking from over here. Sounds a lot like an inflated ego bursting to me?”

“Charming! Is your tongue so sharp around Henry?” He goads her and prepare to doge away from her fast slap.

“Who is he then, o-shadow-of-the-night? It’s not Mr Topping, is it?”

“What _is_ everyone’s fascination with that guy?” Jacob wonders aloud. “No, it’s not the bookie of the people. Go on, one more guess.”

“Frederick?”

“I can’t help thinking he’d panic if ever I called him Sarge after hours.” Jacob comments on Evie’s choice. “Although I do love a spot of role-play...”

“It’s not him then, you’re thinking too much for it to be him.”

“No, it’s not Freddy either. What this is telling me is I have a very small circle of friends, Ev.”

“If the shoe fits...” Evie rolls her lips into a teasing smile.

“He’s a businessman, actually. A big important one. So big--” Jacob begins to gesture lewdly with his hands, merely continuing the act with no real proof.

“That was needless – who is it?” Evie is growing weary with Jacob’s incessant games.

“Maxwell Roth.”

“Businessman? Jacob, he’s the leader of the Blighters! He’s a war merchant, not a businessman.” She laments, flinging her arms wide.

“He’s not the man the papers make him out to be, sister.”

“How do you know he won’t hurt you? That he’s not doing this to get you out of Starrick’s way?” Jacob recognises that Evie’s scepticism isn’t unfounded.

“We’ve been messing around really. Just some fun and games for now.” He backs down a little.

“Well, be careful, brother. It’s just the two of us now.”

“And Henry.” He chips in.

“That’s not what I mean.”

“I’ll tell him you said that!” He smiles widely as she shouts at him.

“Jacob! I mean it!” He calms down for a moment and resolves with a loose-lipped smile that he’ll listen to her.

“I’ll have the talk.”

-

Jacob decides to wait a day before he goes to Roth again. He spends much of that day in Green Park, sitting on the grass and toying with it between his fingers. He tries to picture what to ask Roth, if asking him straight up will muddy the water between them. He realises after a long moment that possible death as a result of being afraid of being impolite isn’t something he wants this to come to and vows to be straight with him, in the metaphorical sense.

He saunters on to the Alhambra, taking in the noise of the city around him like it’s new and alive for him. He asks Lewis at the door, if he can go up and see Mr Roth, but is told he’s out on business. He’s welcome to wait, and he does, having built up a significant amount of nervous energy coming here. He spends almost an hour watching Roth’s crow in his cage, just existing benignly, as he listens to the streets below bubbling with life.

He wonders if Roth already knows he’s here, can he feel him? Can he sense his racing heart within these hallowed halls? Surely not, not until he himself is here at least. Jacob, lost in this thought, doesn’t remember Roth explaining the intricacies of his condition the other night. If he did, Jacob has totally forgotten. He adjusts his weight on his feet but can only wait or leave; speak or die, what other choice does he have? He jumps up some half an hour later when he hears footsteps approaching, readying himself, but is immediately doused when Lewis’ plain face appears through the frame offering him tea. He kindly accepts because it gives him something to do that isn’t perch and listen, like Roth’s damned bird!

Upwards of an hour later, Roth carefully enters his dwelling, sensing someone is upstairs for him before Lewis even tells him. He notes the aroma of blood and Pears’ soap in the air and knows who it is. It didn’t take him long, Roth thinks, he kept himself away for a whole day. He rises up the stairs to his second-floor study-come-office in the building’s disused costume store, smoothing his jacket off as he goes, making himself presentable. He doesn’t feign surprise this time, and instead bounds towards Jacob with open arms, making to embrace the younger man even. Jacob lets himself be wrapped in the wiry arms of the impossible man before him and tries to reciprocate the gesture. The warmth they share in this moment is why he came, he realises.

“Jacob, my dear! A pleasant surprise!” Roth beams. “Although, I must say I expected you. I’m sure you’ve got questions.” He releases the assassin from his firm embrace.

“Max, you’re looking bright-eyed.” Jacob greets him with a delay. “No Regis?”

“Alas; he’s left this blissful city once more, but has promised to return soon.” Roth explains.

“It’s a shame, he had a nice voice.” Jacob comments truly.

“He liked you, and he’s a stellar judge of character.” Roth reveals.

“That is kind of him.” Jacob smiles lightly. “But you’re right, I have questions.”

“Of course.” Roth pulls out the chair nearest the crow and sits himself down, now beside Jacob who is perched atop the table.

“But I have to ask first: what’s going on here?”

“What exactly do you mean?”

“What are we doing?”

“Talking--” Roth begins, somewhat bemused.”—but I trust what you want to hear is that this is a fun little arrangement between very good friends.”

“Is any of this a ploy to get rid of me?”

“Of course not, darling! It never began as such and I don’t want it to be. You have nothing to fear here.” Roth stands up as he speaks, reassuring Jacob with a soft touch of the shoulder. “I don’t give a shit about Starrick’s plan for you. If anything, it’s in my interest for you to get to him first. I do still intend to help you drag him down.” Roth’s lips curl up at the sides. “Raise a little hell, like I say.And who better to do it with than the Devil.”

“You’re no devil.” The leader of the Blighters sidles up to the Frye twin in the swelling dimness of his dusty office.

“Don’t be so sure, my darling. You haven’t heard my terms yet.” He wraps his thin fingers around Jacob’s throat and presses his back against the wall they’re loitering in front of. “Let me sink my teeth into you if ever I ask.”

“You’re insatiable.” Jacob grins, misreading the situation somewhat. “Sure you don’t mean ‘suck me dry’?” He teases, pulling at his belt in jest. 

“All that and more, love; but I do mean sink my teeth in you. Drain you. Adore you absolutely.” Roth closes in on Jacob but let’s his throat go. “Consume you. In the only lasting way I can make you mine.” He raises a hand and tucks a loose length of hair back behind the assassin’s ear. “Just so we’re singing from the same hymn sheet.”

“We’re in perfect harmony, sir.” The muscular brunette agrees, having made up his mind. He recognises the need to compromise and hopes that, for his own sake, it need never come to paying up on his deal. He holds out his hand and waits for the older man to take it. To Jacob’s surprise, he does, but lifts it to his lips and kisses the man’s knuckles. 

“That’s enough foreplay for one night, I think.” Maxwell leans down to whisper in Jacob’s ear. “Fancy toasting our new partnership? On my desk perhaps?”

“Oh that does sound like good business.” 

“I’ll do my due diligence. One can’t be too careful with who they get into bed with.” Roth plays along, leaning back and withdrawing comfortably from the man he plans to pin to his terribly expensive desk.

“And be thorough, won’t you?” Jacob utters under his breath. “I really would love to feel every inch of your ‘due diligence’.” Roth cracks a lustful smile, admiring the confidence and equal foolhardiness of this precocious young killer. He’s sees himself in him, in more ways than one. 


	3. Fun and Games

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roth and Jacob play around on a rooftop.
> 
> (Reimagines Sequence 8's Fun and Games mission a bit)

The night is long and howling and Jacob spends it screaming. A chill courses over his skin as dawn begins to break, he stirs enough to be aware that he’s naked and wrapped in the embrace of an equally unencumbered Maxwell Roth. For a brief flickering moment, Jacob thinks to apologise to Robert Topping for having thought him so weak to be manipulated by Roth. He knows the taste and touch of the man better than he assumes Topping could. He felt every inch of him. He knew him better now, Jacob thought.

Awash in the pale, lacklustre sun as it peeked over London, Jacob rolls over in Maxwell’s arms and settles a chaste kiss to his cheek. He waits for him to ‘wake up’, a generous ruse Max performs for him. Roth truly was at peace, watching over Jacob as he slept. He rested his eyes from the light and almost found rest there himself but was stirred by Jacob turning over to face him. He was uncharacteristically kind enough to play asleep for a moment longer. This was the gift he could give Jacob, the look of a real lover, not the undead performance of sleep for comfort’s sake.

“Morning sunshine.” Jacob purrs, delighting in Roth’s gentle smile.

“Already?” Roth hums, covering his pale eyes.

“‘Fraid so. It creeps up on you, hm?” The assassins runs a hand down his own chest as he stretches the best he can while lying down.

“And what does this morning hold for Master Jacob Frye?” Roth enquires with a stretching arm, gesturing to the vastness of his room. “A brawl or two? Pick off a Blighter while my watchful eye is turned?”

“Grander still.” Jacob teases the older man. ”So grand, in fact, I have a favour to ask.” He opens, displaying his body in the sun for Roth’s approval, as some kind of offering. “Tonight: help me shut down Starrick’s production line.” Jacob jabs his finger into a crude map of the city he has unfurled on Roth’s grand black desk. The whole scene is made only slightly more ludicrous by Jacob’s nakedness, Roth thinks. “This factory is the hub for the Strand and the City; fuelled by child labour and exploitation of the weak. It won’t be much good to him in ashes. So, I propose-“

“-razing it? But the children?“ Roth is already ahead of him, admiring his fingers as they illustrate his thoughts. “It would be a shame to let such young blood spoil.” He mulls the thought as he gives air to it.

“You’re not shutting it down like that, Roth, not while I’m around.” The brunette attacks back, feisty at the idea of his sometime lover being the cause for that harm. Before he can ruminate on the trouble anymore, Maxwell cuts him off.

“Jacob, please; I’m not an animal.” He points to his receded teeth. “What did you think I meant? It’s rude to let their young blood be cut short in the fire. Can we debate the semantics later?” A lull comes between them as Jacob thinks, an unusually docile moment for the rash-thinking man.

“So you’ll help me get them out?” He concludes Roth’s offer, trying to reaffirm that Roth is not this figure he should doubt so often. Roth pulls himself out of bed, missing its warmth already.

“I’ll distract my lads, yes. The rest is yours. There’s no fun in the game if you play it alone.” Jacob smiles at him.

“Deal.” He shakes Roth’s gloved hand. Roth smiles and flashes his teeth at the 21 year old. “I don’t fear you.” The assassin reminds himself as much as he does Roth.

“You should.” Roth’s warning isn’t one made entirely with love. There’s a chill in his tone.

“I could kill you if I needed to, Max.” Jacob assures his older companion.

“Not in any way you know.” Roth’s long shadows wraps itself around the assassin’s feet, like fists grabbing at his ankles. “You could slow me down, my dear boy, but kill me? Never.”

“I don’t want to have to demonstrate, Max; we’re in the middle of something.”

“And here I thought I was the centre of your universe.” He laughs lightly to himself. “Come on, we can bicker later. We ain’t got all day.” Roth jostles the assassin, pulling on some clothes from the floor. It’s only when he’s dressed does he realise not all of them are his own, but Jacob quite like the look. He likes the thought that some part of him is touching Roth, even when he’s away, even more. “Coffee first?” He offers the younger man with a look.

“The perfect host.”

“I’d call you the same but it would cheapen the moment.” Roth grins, ducking through doorframe in a second. “And then you’re out on your ear, Mr Frye! I can’t have you here distracting me _all_ day!” Jacob hears Roth call out as he vanishes from sight. For a split second, Jacob wonders if Roth has transformed into a vapour or some sort of bat to go and get the coffee, but then how would he carry the cups? In the same second, he hates that he has been reading up on vampirism in secret, when he is alone. He wants to understand Roth’s affliction, it transfixes him and makes him weak; the thing Jacob fears most of all. Captivity - even with Roth - would be the end of him, the assassin assures himself.

Two cups of coffee, and several keen hours later, Jacob finds himself perched on top of Roth’s carriage as it rides across the city to a spot near to Starrick’s factory. The horses whinny as they are halted and Maxwell hops out on the cobbles, closely followed by Jacob who almost surprises him. The assassin had caught the crime boss in a rare moment of daydreaming. His thoughts are elsewhere as he steps from the carriage into the blistering daylight, it nips at his eyes as he strides into it. The sun will set soon, but not soon enough for Roth’s liking. Even though it doesn’t harm him, he’s never been fond of sunlight. Apart from perhaps that very morning, as Jacob paraded himself in it. He wore it well, he found himself appreciating, as Jacob appeared beside him like a shadow.

Roth hurries them along the outside of a tenement house, though they try to blend into the light bustle of the street. As they walk, Jacob can smell his own perfume on Roth, noticing he is still wearing Jacob’s waistcoat. He smiles to himself as they makes their way back on themselves to the target.

“Wouldn’t want you to get caught in the sunlight.” Jacob murmurs as he follows behind Roth.

“Been reading, I see.” Roth charms his lover. “I thought you’d have gathered it doesn’t work like it does in the books by now, darling.”

“No, I mean, you’d look really old.” Jacob laughs, ducking out of the way of Roth’s smacking hand.

“Oi!” The low growl accompanies the hand reaching out to punish Jacob. Light as ever, the Frye brother eludes capture and vaults up the side of building to their left, climbing to a steeple where he sits and tips his hat to Roth from on high.He waits for the speech to begin.

“Right, my beauties!” Maxwell kicks his heels into the boards of the raised deck he’s standing on, facing the factory doors. “I’ve got a little news for you all, you rotten lot. Tonight is a celebration, for tonight 4 of you get to leave our happy family for good, full expenditure paid up. A severance package, if you will. Now spots are limited, so fight it out amongst yourselves, I just wanted to be the bearer of good news. Come find me when you’re done and I’ll drain your assets into your hands myself.”

Jacob marvelled at the sheer gall of Roth to incentivise his men to essentially murder each other on the promise of money and freedom, and was afraid in the same appraisal. They ate up every word like he did. He was sure whoever made it through the night wouldn’t live to see the next one. It smacked of insatiable madness that Roth embodied. He was a man comfortable with destruction. He relished it. This once, Jacob could see the benefit in a few less Blighters in the streets, but he sternly promised himself to rein in Roth. Or at least discipline his bloodlust.

While Jacob’s thinking, he hears the fight break out. He uses the clamour and the violence to his advantage and shambles down a few window ledges before duckinginto the factory through an open window. He calms the children he can find and urges them down the stairs, floor by floor, and keeps them inside until he can make sure the back entrance is clear before herding them outside. He petitions them to run off and not come back. To those old enough to join him in the Rooks, he offers that they scavenge for them for pay, shooing them silently with his hands as he listens to several sets of shoes scuffling on the bricks. He watches them leave attentively and then ziplines to a vantage point again, spying out the Blighters’ chaotic leader.

Maxwell isn’t watching for him, his eyes are wide and enthralled in the brawling. They look like they’re on fire, from this distance. He tries to signal him or catch his eye but he’s up too high to be in Roth’s lowered eyeline. Anxious about what Roth might do if left in this arena, the assassin carefully launches a knife at Roth’s shoulder, aiming to graze it or maybe snag the epaulet. Upon hearing it travel, the blood-cursed turns his head and snatches it from the air by the handle. The knife barely misses the older man’s throat by a feeble inch but it summons Roth’s attention to its point of origin. Jacob refrains from waving and instead runs off the top of the roof and swan dives into a pile of leaves. Roth’s smile fades slightly, at the thought of leaving this easy carnage behind but he’ll make the exception for Jacob’s honey-rich blood.

“You were only supposed to make a scene, not make them eat each other alive.”

“I was hungry for a little action.” Roth moans with deliberate emphasis, gesturing that Jacob follow after him as he slips down an alleyway. In a seamless, soft shove, Roth elbows Jacob sideways and against an out of sight wall. He strokes the assassin’s cock through his clothes as he talks.

Jacob wants to feel Roth inside him again, feel his hand push his shoulders down as he leans over him and pushes slowly, feel the other hand holds his head by the neck. Some godless act made louder by cover of shadow and night, laden beneath stars. Jacob wants all of it, as he feels the sun fade on him. He moans a little under Roth’s touch, feeling a heat rise in his veins and elsewhere.

“The night’s ours—-” He lets the words slip over his tongue like a lace that Roth pulls with his own, knotting it and teasing it free from the assassin’s mouth as he kisses him. “Let’s go and watch the smoke rise.” Roth’s mouth smiles against Jacob’s.

As they disappear to a crook of the Alhambra’s roof, Jacob and Roth are pressed close under a blanket of a star-free smoke-filled sky.Roth runs his fingers through Jacob’s hair tenderly, both their heads are tipped up to watch the flames of Starrick’s factory lick at the sky around it. It spits smoke high up, dusting a copse of rooftops with ash as the wind carries it. Jacob crawls the small distance up Roth’s chest so their mouths meet in quiet celebration. The lustre of the moment is worn off by Jacob’s rich laugh as he pulls away from the vampire, telling him he tastes like smoke. Roth laughs with him and agrees, placing a closing kiss on Jacob’s nose. He his body towards Jacob’s as they lie, raised on their elbows.

“I want to be around you. But I can’t let you wreak havoc across the city.” Jacob tells him as they marvel at the light grey smoke curling up into the night.

“You do enough of that for the both of us.” Roth counters, opening his palms passively. Jacob’s feisty jab back comes across as impudent.

“Only to those deserving.”

“And the rest.” Roth quips with a wide smirk. Unable to righteously disagree or feasibly play the devil’s advocate, Jacob leans towards reasoning with Roth. Now, he thinks, is a time for trust and honesty.

“What I’m saying is-I need you to not just kill regardless. Even if you’re starving. Everybody’s hungry. It’s London.”

“You don’t understand, Jacob, my dear. It’s not a matter of hunger. It’s a thirst that needs quenching. One that reaches into the very centre of your bones. It takes hundreds of years to even consider balancing the need with the guilt.”

“What am I supposed to do then?” The assassin asks with a worry, something that makes him turn his whole body inwards to Maxwell.

“Take me to dinner.” Roth asks him, almost politely; smile as wide as it ever is. “Something bloody.” Jacob is unsure whether to take this seriously or not but Roth sharpens his teeth before retracting them as a show of parley. The brunette leans back then, an inquisitive look catching in his eye.

“You said you killed rats, dogs to eat: do you kill people too? It’s a real dealbreaker for me.” Jacob tries to laugh it off in justification.

“You do, darling boy. This feels a little pot call.” Roth wears a slow smile, uttering his words. “And I didn’t say that, you jumped to that conclusion. I kill what I can to eat.”

“You’ll kill me?”

“I’m hungry for something else from you, darling.” Roth leers, running a finger across Jacob’s teeth before swooping his head down to kiss the assassin’s neck.

“If I break your deal, what’s stopping you from just killing me. Keep me quiet.” The assassin speculates, in a haze of worry and bluster. He stands up as he speaks, making a subtle point of keeping a distance. Roth follows him but respects the gap between them.

“You’ll have to just trust me.” He smiles with a malice now, clearly hurt by Jacob’s suggestion. “And I think even death wouldn’t keep you quiet, Jacob, my dear. Not to be rude.” Roth seals his lips before letting the small silence grow between them. He goes so far as to cross the gap, putting three fingers to Jacob’s soft lips to shut him up for a moment. “I respect you too much to simply destroy you, Jacob.” Roth utters before finally whispering: “I adore you, alive.” Another minute is still between the pair before Roth draws his fingers back. He felt the subtle but distinct act of Jacob kissing against them as he took in his words.

“More than life?” Jacob has grown heady and lightheaded simultaneously, soaking in confusion and Roth’s sincere-feeling declaration.

“I often think so.” He muses, flicking his hand away like he is shooing a fly in shooing the notion. “But I’ve a temper you’d do well to keep in the good side of.” Maxwell duly warns Jacob to reassert dominance over him, afraid for a moment of losing lust at the cost of love.

As last Jacob speaks, closing in on Roth’s receding form as he leaves. “I trust you.” It’s all he can say at this moment, gently bringing his gloved hand around Roth’s waist and pulling him forward at the hips. They kiss because Jacob makes it so. Their teeth clack together in what becomes a furious and longing kiss, they are too caught up in it even to move. Silhouetted against the fire raging behind them, the lovers come to a kiss that could last all night, but the heated and tireless fuck that comes from it interrupts that vignette. In the view of the moon, Roth takes Jacob. The ecstasy is only matched by the cool touch of the air, thrilling their skin as they tear strips off each other. Jacob pulls Roth down by the hair while he’s inside him and brings him into a kiss Depp enough to fall into. Roth moans, deep and gravelly in his throat, though each becomes lighter as it’s cried into the night air. Roth’s teeth catch Jacob’s lip and cut it as they throw their heads apart in a final glistening moment of pleasure.Breathless and unable to prise themselves apart, Roth leansdown ever so slowly to run his tongue over the bleeding lip below him. Jacob tastes divine and looks even better, sweating and out of breath beneath him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think.  
> Regis will return soon! xx

**Author's Note:**

> A new RothFrye in v quick succession to the last one finishing.  
> Let me know what you think xx


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